MGoBoard FAQ

New users are not entrusted with that capability until they reach 100 points. (Updated 11/29/2010)

How do I get points?

Every time you post a comment or reply in a thread you get a point.

Wait… then why do I have negative 60?

You can't see this yet—you won't until you get to 100 points, naturally—but all posts/comments come with the ability to vote up or down on them. If you post things that are displeasing to the general populace, you will lose points as people downvote you. You get two points per upvote and minus one per downvote.

Getting personal on college athletes usually results in a deletion, and virtually always when it's a Michigan player in question. Threads that invite flaming also get deleted. Threads with misleading titles designed to scare the crap out of readers before they click will either be deleted or edited so that their titles reflect their contents.

Can I repeat premium information?

To a limited extent. More details are here. Briefly: don't hit CTRL+C, and don't repeat every last detail.

What's the offtopic policy?

In the offseason, offtopic posts are tolerated. During football season they are discouraged and may be subject to removal depending on how alert the moderators are. What counts as on- and off- topic?

ONTOPIC

Anything Michigan sports related

Anything related to other Big Ten teams or upcoming opponents

Stuff about the blog itself

University of Michigan topics that don't relate to sports

GRAY AREA

College sports in general

Ann Arbor

UNWELCOME, KTHX

Politics

Drew Sharp, Ace Williams, Mike Valenti. Saying stupid and/or false things about Michigan in order to get Michigan fans upset is a tried and true way to phish for clicks. Let's not feed the trolls.

OFFTOPIC

Pro sports of any variety

Everything else

We will let pro sports topics slide even during football season but "everything else" posts are likely to get the axe.

More points should be required to start a diary than a message board post. Diaries need more thought and work than a couple of sentences on the board.
I would propose 40 mgopoints to start a diary, and keep the message board thread limit at 20.

Maybe I'm just blind, but I don't see where you can vote or downvote posts that you read. I occasionally see people write "+1" in their actual posts, but I assume that doesn't actually translate into gaining points

It seems like you're referring to MGoBoard using the link along the top banner. I don't know how to answer your question as it pertains to that link.

However, there is still a way to view just the threads you've posted in. Towards the top, left-hand side you'll see a link entitled "Recent Posts". This will initially display all recent posts on MGoBoard and in the Diaries. At the top of this list, there is a tab entitled "My Recent Posts". This will show you all the threads you've commented in.

I've been on MGoBlog for a while, but haven't commented at all. But now I need some information on Fan Day. So in lieu of a board entry (since I'm way short of 20 points), where can I find the information? I'd love to hear about others' experiences so I know what to expect.

Linebacker Quintin Tucker (6-2, 235) from San Diego (Calif.) Scripps Ranch is a player to watch this coming fall. He didn't get a chance to play a full season as a junior due to CIF transfer rules, but he was impressive. One of the strongest players in the country. Has a max bench press of over 405lbs. Played with Tate last season.

Gerg makes reference to an ongoing EDSBS joke. Orson mistyped it, but found his failing to spell his name as bad as his job at Syracuse, if I read it correctly.

In addition to finding sudden joy in mistyping Gerg Robinson’s name, since “Gerg” seems like such a better nickname than any other we can make up, the long, painful, fat-man-tumbling-downhill decline of Syracuse is made all the more interesting for us as teams now seemingly out of league are now licking their chops at the prospect of playing the Orangemen.

Negative. Brian definitely isn't allowing you to know who votes on your posts. That would cause endless, and needless, feuds between posters. The only way to track the post is to go back and look at what you've done. Points aren't supposed to matter. They are there only to weed out those who would register right after a devastating Michigan loss to come and troll. There were some adjustments on what it takes to write a diary after the series of tubes that is MGoDiaries was clogged with some of the most useless posts imaginable.

I've had a question for awhile now, and it just came up again this week...

I remember reading a post (or posts) to the effect of "if you don't like what I say, tell me why, and I'll still get the points for it", and people posting just for points, etc, etc.

So, does one get points for people responding to their posts, or threads they create? How does that work? Because I've never notice much of a bump (or drop for that matter) for any threads I've created, whether they be long or small.

It doesn't matter much to me at this point, since I've got points to spare, but it may be informative for the desperate noob trying to earn their keep (yes, I remember what that felt like).

I started a post earlier today and got 13 upvotes. These aren't included in my total. Why the distinction between upvotes to a reply (which do go into my total) and upvotes to original content (which don't)? I haven't seen this explained anywhere.

First, the following is limited to only Detroit teams (Tigers, Red Wings, Pistons, Lions, future Detroit MLS teams, etc). I don't like this rule, but Brian's email inbox is a democratic, complaint box, and since most of you are Detroit fans, yours gets to stay.

Game threads and VERY important news will be fine. The subjective level of what is deemed important is left to the decision of the moderators. My e-pinion is that news on trades, injuries to starters, or "yay! we made the playoffs" are all acceptable. Game threads should be enough to capture most of the rest.

To those who do start open threads, if you could be so kind as to invite and allow a little talk of other pro sports teams without them being the focus, that would be generous of you. A good, working example, the nightly college football viewing threads aren't just about ND/MSU, other games get discussed. Those work well.

1. Up-voting your own OPs is a sure fire way to make a poor impression.

2. Starting the thread about Denard's durability after it has been discussed several times is a sure fire way to make a poor impression.

3. You started a thread called "Spitting..." about Roh and Jaws which was deleted pretty quickly.

4. You got mixed in with the BlueJonny/NateSezGoBlue crowd last night. The common presumption was that you were all the same person circle jerking each other with up votes. Whether or not that is true, I don't know. Most of those threads were pulled for stupidity.

5. Like it or not, this board functions the way it does based on Negative Reenforcement (When your dog shits on the rug, you smack the shit out of it with a newspaper - I don't know if Negative Reenforcement is the right term). For better or worse, the only way people seem to learn to stop posting like jackasses is to mock the shit out of them. Kindly explaining the rights and wrongs has proved useless time and time again.

2. I'm new to the site- did not know there were extensive posts on Denards durability.

3. The thread 'Spitting...' was deleted because I specifically asked the MOD to delete it simply because I was tired of people bitching about something that looked funny.

4. I'm not the same person- no idea how that started.

5. You can't be a jackass unless you mean to be a jackass. I didn't. Makes the site feel like newcomers are not welcome. I get that negative reinforcement is sometimes necessary, but it should be reserved for people who really are jackasses- not the one's who are excited they just found what seemed like a great Michigan blog site.

I have been following this site for a couple years, and it seems like the arrogant crowd is getting out of hand. Before the great point requirement uppage of 2010, it seemed like 2/3 of the posts had someone in it crying about how the poster shouldn't be allowed to post regardless of the actual content. What people really need to realize is that we are all here because we all love Michigan. We're on the same team. Furthermore, we also need to realize that point total has very little to do with actual knowledge/fandom of Michigan football. The culture of spitting in the face of users with fewer points than yourself is very silly. It's not that the new users can't handle some good gestured ribbing, but that it isn't necessary.

I think this has sort of been in the air for a while, but I thought it might be helpful if there was a push to start consolidating threads more. I've noticed a lot of aggravation lately about new topics which are very similar to ones that have already been started. In the last few days I have noticed new topics every time someone has a prediction for the UM/MSU game and we've had four or five topics about the #1 jersey that have been extremely similar.

If there was some sort of concerted effort by the mods and the regular posters to try and encourage posters to simply add replies to already existing threads, I think it would lower the stress-level around here a bit and make the board a bit easier to navigate as a whole. I'm not sure how much good it would do to add something onto the FAQ about adding to similar threads rather than creating new ones, but I figure it couldn't hurt.

Also, in this same vein, it might be nice to break up the board into some sub-boards. I'm not sure how feasible that is from a technical standpoint, but I think it would reduce a lot of the complaining about irrelevant topics if we had an OT board. I know this has been said before, but I just wanted to throw it out there again.

it's a joke that started at EverydayshouldbeSaturday that J Lehman, and then Ricky Stanzi love america more than anyone and exemplify awesomeness and patriotism. Or something like that. Someone link the appropriate Stanzi clips and J Lehman photos please?

Did they show that sign or could you hear the chants in the 4th quarter? I was there for the whole thing. I used to feel a twinge of guilt when the kids wore their "Worst State Ever" t-shirts. Uh, let's just say I'm past that. The truck drivers seem to forget going 2-10-1. Fortunes switch. Jamiemac should take the under, however, on how classy I remain when that day happens.

specifically, why doesn't this board use the same set up as every other board in existence?

i find it difficult sometimes following threads because a) responses aren't in order, b) i have no idea where my response is likely to go in the thread sometimes (unless i'm replying to someone specifically), c) just seems scattered about.

why can't the boards just be normal? :) that way when i post in a thread, and i see it gets bumped again, i know where we're at in the thread and that maybe someone responded to me.

but apparently i'm retarded, because i messed with all that before and can't figure out how to just set it up like a 'regular' message board: first response is first, last response is last and everything is just linear. this setup fucks with me hardcore for some reason...

i can't set it up so that threads go from first post to last post and that's it? where replying to someone doesn't go into the thread where you replied but at the end only with the original quote with it?

but apparently i'm retarded, because i messed with all that before and can't figure out how to just set it up like a 'regular' message board: first response is first, last response is last and everything is just linear. this setup fucks with me hardcore for some reason...

i can't set it up so that threads go from first post to last post and that's it? where replying to someone doesn't go into the thread where you replied but at the end only with the original quote with it?

"Listed-Expanded" and "Date-Oldest First" would work for the most part. However, the board doesn't autoquote replies (I think this is an option with vBulletin software) and people generally don't use the block quotes in replies, so I think people find it harder to work with.

that's what i'm using now (list expanded and date oldest) but i wish it was v-bulletin i guess...making pages 300 responses and getting around to putting up an avatar helps a lot, as i can just scroll until i see my avatar. :)

To see all the threads you've posted in, and it will list them in order of most recent responses, and which ones have "new" posts. Then you can just look at the ones with the red "new" label. And if someone replied to you at that point, it should be labeled new.

I'm negbombing as I find them. There's A LOT of threads and I'm just catching comments here and there. When I find the penis one (which I'm searching right now), they will lose many more points than you did.

My way of moderating is go down long threads, look for a long string of replies, then look for people who were negged or pos'd in large amounts. If either said something that was ad hominem or insulting, I throw them a -1000 bomb. Unless it's an obvious joke, of course.

It's not the best filter, but it's generally effective as a warning system. Like you said, otherwise I'd have way too much work to do.

I'm not sure which CC thread the particular one you received yours for, but I'd bet it was somewhere in the CC: for pro-RR camp thread. There were about 7 or 8 tossed in there.

Is anybody else losing points to expiration at a rapid rate? I've lost about 100 points in the last few weeks due to it. I'm not one who measures himself by his point total. My thing is if it keeps up at this rate I could end up inthe neg without actually having people neg me. Then Brian is alerted that you are in the neg I'd feel like I'd be summoned to the principal's office without doing anything wrong.

I got shitnegged before for asking this but I'm only asking because I don't know and I only need to be told once and then I never need to ask again. Can someone please explain what the deal is with points expiring, what does that mean and why do they expire? Also, why is the point system currently not working is it just a problem with the site right now? Thanks.

Can someone please explain what the deal is with points expiring, what does that mean and why do they expire?

It means 365 days have passed since the points were acquired/lost, so they expire and we have to get rid of them. If we keep them around they might gain sentience and go all Skynet on us (it also saves on database space).

Also, why is the point system currently not working is it just a problem with the site right now? Thanks.

Yes, there is coding that needs to happen on the backend in order to make the point system 100% functional.

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And not embedding a picture, for reasons I cannot explain, I've read from other posters that putting in new ones is down now (and even if you take your own out, you wouldn't be able to put it back in. That's what she said).

It had something to do with the great site crash of 2011. If it's back up, ever, I would think that the off-season would be the earliest, and is on the to do list, but won't get a whiff with as busy as football season is...and may wait till post hockey/basketball.

For some reason, my last few posts have started out with a "Score:2". Just curious if there's a reason for this because I swear I'm not pos-banging myself (not that Score:# really even makes a difference)

You can use html by using the "Switch to plain text editor" button below.

You can find the text of "Shockfx"'s 2009-era html post in "Raoul"'s comment on the thread here, or follow the link in that comment and see it with all the comments (many informative) here ("Google cache feature," per "Raoul"). I have no idea how he dug it up.

Now, can someone tell me what are "Karma" points and should I want more of them?

The score above your posts reflects how everyone feels about them. -1 is the lowest the score goes, +5 is the highest. All scores have an adjective attached, but just know that people can be completely arbitrary. We pride ourselves on being logical and informed, but there will be times you need a thick skin to post anything (there is a Sonic not far from Ohio Stadium, Urban Meyer has MNC rings, whatever) with your avatar and username, because someone will neg them no matter the content. OTOH there are several MSU and OSU fans here that get great receptions, though those are earned based on reputation (WatersDemos is a great MSU poster, I think UrbanWarfare and BucksfanXC do a good job from OSU).

When you get 100 MGoPoints, you are allowed to post original topics and "moderate" or vote on posts; the top left of your screen will change with that option. At 500, you can edit the MGoHallOfFame*, two-deep and offer list. Other than that, the purpose of points these days is just to identify who posts a lot.

Check out this link here: http://mgoblog.com/diaries/meta-info-new-mgoboarders and go ahead and post any new questions on this thread. I've been meaning to tell you that you're a good poster here (considering you're a Buckeye.../s) and would be happy to answer anything you want to know about the site. Cheers.

Anyway, I try to be as knowledgeable and objective to Michigan fans when I make post so that they contribute to the conversation. I know some Michigan fans will bash me because I'm an OSU guy but its ok, I've been treated way worse my Wisconsin fans in Madison and online. Thanks for being respectful even thought I'm an OSU fan and answering my questions...

The link you gave me had everything I wanted but if you know how to edit your post after you post them that would be great. Also, I like the point system you guys have here. Elevenwarriors just started one a week ago that works similar to what you guys have. I need to get to 100 points before the Michigan game so I can ask you guys some questions on my own post.

glad to help. Hit "edit" on the bottom right corner of your posts. This thread seems like something is wrong. I keep getting logged out and I can't vote on your post. Seems like a computer issue that's over my head.

I'm not sure if anyone went to THE GAME or to campus bars but I wanted to hear how everyone experiences went. I don't want to rub anyone the wrong way since we are rivals but I like to hear what people think. I don't have enough MgoBlog points to start a thread. Could someone start one.

You recently created this topic and I have no way to personally message you so I'm hoping you come across this. Go back to the topic you started and check for my feedback. I recently left you something that might be worthwhile to improving the site for visitors experience. Disregard this if you've already read it but it got buried below all the other new topics.

Thanks for putting the time in, especially considering [maize and blue site + heathen Buckeye joke here]. I'm trying to make a final decision and get whatever that is written and up on the site; the goal is Monday morning, maybe Tuesday or Wednesday if I end up needing some HTML help.

Right now, I'm not sure how to handle a lot of your suggestions, but I will forward that post to Seth (he's the site editor) and see if he wants to impliment anything you suggested. The issue with making a lot of those recommendations to me is the limited scope of things I can do. I can get new stickys up or edit threads or adjust points, but I don't have much more input into the sites construction than anyone else with a good idea. For you personally, you have the points to create threads/diaries now, and pretty much everything you wrote out would be a fine forum topic and would get good answers.

Oh, I almost forgot. This piece basically tore the site apart with like a dozen debate threads on the qualities of a good deli and where the best place to go after having too much to drink the night before (and where to drink too much the night before), but it is pretty much exactly what you were talking about as far as an Ann Arbor guide.

Well that link you gave me will serve perfectly for helping to plan my trip up to Ann Arbor. I'll bookmark it and save it under my favorites. Sorry to hear it created ripples among MgoBlog users but it seems informative to me. Hope my suggestions help in some way. Thanks!

Just out of curiosity, are you coming up for the basketball game or waiting until football season? I selfishly have another Ann Arbor café for you to take a look at whenever you start planning your trip.

I plan on going to Ann Arbor for the football game this year with a few other recent alums to scratch off another B1G school from our list of schools we've been to. Unless our plans get mixed up and we end up just going to Northwestern we'll be there too. However, once we finish our football tour, we probably will travel to each B1G school for a basketball game. If you wanna share your recommendation for which cafe' to check out go ahead, I'll add it to my sticky note under things to check out on campus. I can always start a thread asking for advice and recommendations for my trip or ask my friend who went to Law school there to get more input as the time gets closer.

This sucks that I have to wait til I get 100 points before I can post something!!! I have something I want to talk about and get off my chest something about the Mich vs. Mich St. game at the Joe yesterday (Feb.2nd) that happened to my girlfriend and I. I just joined this blog site the day after the game to discuss it with you guys now I have to wait til I get more points...

Just as a general rule of thumb, if it's something you want to "get off your chest", it's definitely a good idea to think twice about posting it. A couple questions to ask yourself:

1) Is it repetitive? That is, is it something we've all experienced and discussed a thousand times before? We all have stories of bad behavior by opposing fan bases, and the topic has been brought up many times in the past.

2) Is it noteworthy? That is, does it bring something qualitatively (not merely quantitatively) new to the table? Take for an example, a study by a research foundation that indicates that OSU fans are statistically more likely to be meatheads. That's worth its thread, because it brings something new to the conversation.

In summary, one fan's tale of abuse isn't particularly noteworthy, unless something truly momentous happened. The typical internet adage "LURK MOAR" applies here; this community does come down harsh on "bad" threads, but the benefit of that is that you don't have to wade through seas of "Cool Story Bro" type posts to get the good stuff most of the time. Welcome and I hope you like it here!

I use a Mac (I use safari and chrome), and I have a glitch where anytime I try to access beyond page 1 of board topics, I see older blog posts, etc. Anything BUT actual board threads. Is there any fix to this?

first, you can click "recent" and that will let you scroll through pages sorted by most recent comments. The other thing that works is opening the second page in a new tab, just by right clicking and selecting "open in new tab".

is a set of two arrows for threads and diary voting, and then every comment should have a scroll down list and a button that says "moderate" centered at the bottom of the comment. Are you seeing all of that or no?

Hi, My dilemma is this: I have a great true story about Trey Burke but being new here I cannot post it yet. I've been meaning to tell this story for months but now would be the perfect time. Would it be possible to send you my idea and if approved post it as soon a possible? I read M-Goblog every day but would never be a reguar poster or commenter. The list would really appreciate this story.

Link in the "How can I bold stuff, insert images, embed videos, etc?" FAQ above no longer works. In trying to find it, I noticed a bunchof old articles in the forums noting it was gone... but it's still here.

In my opinion, a link to the "META: Embed Refresher Course" article here would be helpful. I found an older one which ranked higher in my Google search but didn't work as it pre-dated the current software.

The problem with your code is you are doing this #t=23s. Well that only works to post a youtube link that makes the video start at a certain time on the youtube page. If you want the embed link to work you have to do this:

Hey. I am a HUGE Michigan fan living in Tennessee. Does anyone here have a watchespn subscription they would be willing to let me use so i can watch michigan when they are on espn. I have a btn2go subscription by watchespn is unsupported by my dish network subscription. Anything would help! Thanks

Copy whatever it is you want to copy. The when you want to paste it in the body of a new thread. Click in the body of the thread and then hold down ctrl or command. Ctrl for a windows, Command for a Mac and while you're holding that down hit V. It will paste whatever you copied into the body of the new thread.

Is there an easy way to see if another poster has replied to one of your posts? If not, can it be developed?

The only way I see to go back to an exchange I was having is to click on "My Account" and see the posts I made. When I click on them, they often take me to the beginning of the thread and not my post. That means sifting through multiple pages to find it, only to sometimes see there was no response.

I've been at other forums that have notifications when you have a reply, and a link embedded that takes you directly to the reply.

Is there a chance we could deal with the downvoting of old posts issue? Brian had mentioned that he wanted to address this. Some psycopath has just downvoted about 300 of my old posts in the service of some creepy vendetta. Any chance this can be fixed?

Oh, they're not missing, sorry for the confusion. What I meant was, when I go to "my account," it shows all of my posts as hyperlinks. When I click on the hyperlink, sometimes it takes me dierctly to my post in the thread, and sometimes it just takes me to the thread generally, and then in order to find my post, I have to scroll and scroll.

I am going to my first Michigan game at the end of September for Minnesota. I am so excited! I just wondered what I should definitely check out while I am in town for the weekend. My wife got me the tickets for my birthday so I would like to do something she nice for her while we are there and also enjoy the campus and of course Ann Arbor.

Are avatar uploads still not working? I could only find a couple posts discussing them and it seems uploading them were disabled in 2011, but don't know if the problem was fixed. I went to change mine and it says it wasn't possible. Keep getting this:

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First attempt at a post, and I'm old, so trying it here first where hopefully won't bother anyone since this is the first post in this in four years. Please feel free to delete to keep this clean for other users - Just wanted to see the post. Thanks!

Click "my account" on the upper left of the screen and then you should have an "edit" option at the top of the page. Put a new username into the "username" spot and click "save" and you should be all set.

You have brains in your head.
You have feet in your shoes.
You can steer yourself any direction you choose.
You're on your own.
And you know what you know.
And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go...

I was at Yost on Fri. 11/27/15 to see the Wolverines whip Dartmouth 7-0. A student sitting on the glass had a sign poking fun at Dartmouth player River Rymsha from Huntington Woods, Mich. Here is a link to the photo and the album of photos from the game. You can download photos from the site.